Analyst Angle: Buying into the ‘real’ mobile Internet

Editor’s Note: Welcome to our weekly feature, Analyst Angle. We’ve collected a group of the industry’s leading analysts to give their outlook on the hot topics in the wireless industry. In the coming weeks look for columns from Current Analysis’ Avi Greengart, Jupiter Research’s Julie Ask and Telephia’s Levi Shapiro.
Many in the wireless and mobile industry have been discussing for some time the potential associated with giving consumers access to the full Internet on a mobile device, as opposed to the filtered, formatted and graphic-limited version of the Internet we now get on the majority of mobile handsets. Sprint Nextel, Intel, Apple and others talk about uncompromised mobile access to the full Internet, where consumers can access every and all Web sites and interact just as they would on a landline, broadband-connected browser.
Well, having used the iPhone for a couple of months now, I get it. I understand what they were talking about and just how compromised Internet access is on a conventional mobile handset. I must also acknowledge that I happily accessed the Internet from a smartphone or feature phone for years (as members of my family now do). But after using the iPhone, I realize that my prior access had really been one-way-I had been reading and referencing the Internet but was not fully interacting. I was reading news articles, blogs, sport sites, etc., but with limited navigation and certainly with limited data entry on search or shopping sites.
The iPhone is a game changer. By providing a full browser, I now have access to every site I do on my desktop PC. Certainly I would like a faster wireless connection, but I have been pleasantly surprised by the performance of AT&T’s EDGE network-it is much faster than I experienced in the past. Whatever they did to fix it, it worked!
What difference does a full browser on a mobile handset with a wide area data connection make? A couple of examples:
–We were having dinner with friends, and one of their brothers was getting married and had set up a Web site for the engagement. Yes, really. So I hopped on the iPhone and pulled up the Web site and started reading. It was bad. Really bad.
–Driving back from a south Texas beach last weekend (take a look at a map-we were in the middle of nowehere), we remembered my daughter needed a hockey stick in the next few days. So at 80 mph (my wife was driving), I Googled hockey sticks, found an online store and pulled up a few images. My daughter then selected the one she needed, I ordered it with my credit card, entered the shipping address and placed the order.
–Driving to lunch with my wife, she asked how many Harry Potter VII books I had ordered from Barnes & Noble (one) and if we could get another (so the family could read in shifts!). So, I hopped on Google Maps, pulled up the road we were on, searched for the local Barnes & Noble and called them directly. Yes, I could have called 411 from my cellphone but that costs a $1-this was free and I did not have to talk to a machine.
So I do not need any convincing of the value of unhindered access to the full Web, and I suspect that the majority of iPhone users feel the same way. The next generation of handsets and networks will have to support this level of Web access and more-faster speeds, faster browsers and more memory. Networks will be WiMAX and UMB and other future developments. We have talked in the past about the need for a mobile device positioned in functionality and price between the laptop and the smartphone-today that device is the iPhone, but next it will be Intel’s Mobile Internet Device concept or Nokia’s 800 tablet or any other OEM’s development of the iPhone concept.
Questions or comments about this column? Please e-mail Iain at [email protected] or RCR Wireless News at [email protected].